These melt-in-your-mouth chocolate chip scones are tender and moist with deliciously crumbly edges. If you want to eat chocolate chip cookies for breakfast, this chocolate chip scone recipe is definitely the answer.
Let’s make chocolate chip scones! Or, as I like to call them, crispy chocolate chip cookies masquerading as scones. I swear, these really do taste like chocolate chip cookies. And if you’re craving brownies, here are my chocolate scones.
Scones are one of my favorite pastries. I use the same master scones recipe for a variety of flavors including blueberry scones, ham and cheese scones, cinnamon scones, and cranberry orange scones. If you find a base recipe you love, why look further? I do the same with my vanilla cupcakes. From that base recipe, I created chai latte cupcakes, confetti cupcakes, and even mimosa cupcakes. Sky’s the limit!
My careful scone formula promises the best flavor and texture. Using a handful of basic ingredients like flour, butter, and sugar, you can create a decadent breakfast pastry comparable to (or even better than!) most bakeries.
These Chocolate Chip Scones Have:
- Dozens of chocolate chips in each bite (like having chocolate chip cookies for breakfast!)
- Sweet crumbly edges
- Crunchy golden brown exterior
- Soft, moist, buttery centers
- Lots of brown sugar flavor
- A snow shower of powdered sugar on top!
Or you could even top with vanilla icing, extra chocolate chips, or a simple chocolate drizzle like I use on these 20 minute chocolate crescents.
How to Make Chocolate Chip Scones
These chocolate chip scones are surprisingly quick and easy. First, mix the dry ingredients together. You need flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. Second, cut cold butter into the dry ingredients. You can use a pastry cutter or 2 forks, like we do with pie crust, or your hands. A food processor works too, but it often overworks the scone dough. To avoid overly dense scones, work the dough as little as possible.
Next, whisk the wet ingredients together. You need heavy cream, brown sugar, 1 egg, and vanilla extract. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, add the chocolate chips, then gently mix together. Form the dough into a disc on the counter, then cut into 8 wedges. Before baking, brush the scones with heavy cream and sprinkle with coarse sugar. These extras add a bakery-style crunch and beautiful golden sheen. Delicious.
One of my tricks: To obtain a flaky center and a crumbly exterior, keep scone dough as cold as possible. I highly recommend chilling the shaped scones for at least 15 minutes prior to baking. You can even refrigerate overnight for a quick breakfast in the morning!
After that, bake the scones until golden brown.
Frozen Grated Butter
Frozen grated butter is key to chocolate chip scone success. As with pie crust, work cold butter into the dry ingredients. The cold butter coats the flour, which creates tons of flour coated butter crumbs. When the butter/flour crumbs melt as the scones bake, they release steam which creates all the delicious flakiness we love. The exterior becomes crumbly, crunchy, and crisp. Aka the best part about scones.
Refrigerated butter might melt in the dough as you work with it, but frozen butter will hold out until the oven. And the finer the pieces of cold butter, the less the scones spread and the quicker the butter mixes into the dry ingredients. Remember, you don’t want to over-work scone dough.
I recommend grating the frozen butter with a box grater.
The SECRET to Light-Textured Scones
For deliciously flaky and light-textured scones, avoid over-working the dough. My goodness, this is KEY! Use a pastry cutter for the cold butter instead of a food processor. Use your hands to pat the dough into a disc. The dough will be messy and crumbly—don’t worry, that’s a good thing!
Video Tutorial
If you’re interested, I have a 5 minute video demonstrating the scone recipe. I’m making blueberry scones in this video, but the base recipe and process is exactly the same.
How to Freeze Scones
Two options here!
- Freeze Before Baking: Freeze scone dough wedges for 1 hour. Once relatively frozen, layer them in a freezer-friendly bag or container. Bake from frozen, adding a few minutes to the bake time in the recipe below. Or thaw overnight, then bake as directed.
- Freeze After Baking: Freeze the baked and cooled scones before topping with icing or confectioners’ sugar. I usually freeze in a freezer-friendly bag or container. Thaw on the counter or overnight in the refrigerator. Warm in the microwave for 30 seconds or on a baking sheet in a 300°F (149°C) oven for 10 minutes.
Chocolate Chip Scones
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 25 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour
- Yield: 8 large scones
- Category: Breakfast
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These chocolate chip scones are crispy chocolate chip cookies in scone form! They’re buttery and moist with crisp crumbly edges and soft flaky centers. Read through the recipe before beginning. You can skip the chilling for 15 minutes prior to baking, but I highly recommend it to prevent the scones from over-spreading.
Ingredients
- 2 cups (250g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled), plus more for hands and work surface
- 2 and 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (8 Tbsp; 113g) unsalted butter, frozen
- 1/2 cup (120ml) heavy cream (plus 2 Tbsp for brushing)
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1 and 1/4 cups (225g) mini chocolate chips*
- optional: coarse sugar for sprinkling on top before baking
- optional: confectioners’ sugar for sifting on top after baking
Instructions
- Whisk flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt together in a large bowl. Grate the frozen butter using a box grater. Add it to the flour mixture and combine with a pastry cutter, two forks, or your fingers until the mixture comes together in pea-sized crumbs. See video above for a closer look at the texture. Place in the refrigerator or freezer as you mix the wet ingredients together.
- Whisk 1/2 cup heavy cream, brown sugar, the egg, and vanilla extract together in a small bowl. Drizzle over the flour mixture, add the chocolate chips, then mix together until everything appears moistened.
- Pour onto the counter and, with floured hands, work dough into a ball as best you can. Dough will be sticky. If it’s too sticky, add a little more flour. If it seems too dry, add 1-2 more Tablespoons heavy cream. Press into an 8-inch disc and, with a sharp knife or bench scraper, cut into 8 wedges.
- Brush scones with remaining heavy cream and for extra crunch, sprinkle with coarse sugar. (You can do this before or after refrigerating in the next step.)
- Place scones on a plate or lined baking sheet (if your fridge has space!) and refrigerate for at least 15 minutes.
- Meanwhile, preheat oven to 400°F (204°C).
- Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or silicone baking mat. After refrigerating, arrange scones 2-3 inches apart on the prepared baking sheet(s).
- Bake for 22-25 minutes or until golden brown around the edges and lightly browned on top. Remove from the oven and cool for a few minutes before enjoying. Dust with confectioners’ sugar if desired.
- Leftover scones keep well at room temperature for 2 days or in the refrigerator for 5 days.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: See blog post above.
- Overnight Instructions: Prepare scones through step 4. Cover and refrigerate overnight. Continue with the recipe the following day.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowls | Box Grater | Pastry Cutter | Whisk | Rubber Spatula | Bench Scraper | Baking Sheet | Silicone Baking Mat or Parchment Paper | Pastry Brush
- Chocolate Chips: I prefer mini chocolate chips because you get more in every bite! Regular size is just fine, though you may want to increase the amount to 1 and 1/2 cups (270g).
- Over-spreading: Start with very cold scone dough. Expect some spread, but if the scones are over-spreading as they bake, remove from the oven and press back into its triangle shape (or whatever shape) using a rubber spatula.
Keywords: scones, chocolate chip scones
I tried these today and loved them. Just moist enough and great flavor.
Made these today and they were delicious. Tasted like a warm chocolate chip cookie but better! Thanks for a great base recipe, can’t wait to try different variations!!
SALLY!! these are amazing!! FIRST time ever making scones and they were a success!! Thanks so much ! You make your recipes so easy to follow!! BRAVO!
Made these today and the whole family loved them! Perfect with a cup of coffee or a glass of milk. The dough was a smidge too dry so I splashed a little heavy cream on my hands while I kneaded it and it worked out perfect! Also maybe add some more sugar if you want something sweeter, other than that they were perfect
Wow, these were amazing, everyone in my family loved them! Will definitely make again for breakfast 🙂
I followed the recipe exactly, but my dough was still dry after adding in the wet ingredients. Do you have any suggestions? I noticed others had this problem too. The taste was fine but they didn’t come out as pretty as yours
Nicole, try reducing the flour by 3-4 Tablespoons. This should help.
I just made the scones today and they came out delicious!!The only change I would make next time would be to lessen the amount of cinnamon and add a little bit of granulated sugar. I felt that they weren’t sweet enough and that it was a tad too much cinnamon for my taste(not a fan of a lot of cinnamon) Thank you for this delicious scone recipe!!
These were delicious and unexpectedly easy to make. Have made them 2 times in one week. I like the tip to freeze the butter and grate it,made it easier to cut in. Family was here and we all really liked them. Thank you for such an easy scone recipe!
Hi Sally,
I tried these choc chip scones today and they were amaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaazing. So yummy!!
This is the first time I tried making scones and they were so good. Thanks for the great recipes!!
I am turning into this crazy baking lady:) I keep refreshing your webpage to see if you uploaded any new recipes. I don’t want to miss out on any:)
Thanks again.
Hi Sally, I love this recipe for chocolate scones and am planning to make them tomorrow. I also have a bunch of leftover blueberries and I was wondering how much blueberries I could add to this recipe. Should I put only half choco chips and half blueberries, or add one cup of each?
Add 3/4 cup each.
Could I take out the chocolate chips and add an extra tsp. of vanilla extract for vanilla scones?
Do you have any ideas of how I could make vanilla scones? Thanks!! 😀
Yes you can do that. I would also add the seeds scraped from half of a vanilla bean– for extra pure vanilla flavor. Enjoy!
I was wondering, instead of trying to form the dough into an eight inch disk, would it be possible to use my 8 inch springform pan?
Absolutely!
These are amazing! This was the first time I’ve ever made scones and I am not disappointed! I will definitely use this recipe again.
My four year old had been chattering for a month about his latest invention, the “scookie.” Evidently that’s what you get when you smash a cookie and scone together and bake it. I found this recipe so he could fulfill his sweet little dream and it was absolutely perfect. We’ve made it 3x now. Thanks for saving our scookie!
I made these this afternoon and ohmygoodness, they were AMAZING. Seriously, so freaking good. I’ve only made scones from a pre-made mix before so this was a new beginning for me in baking and I had a lot of fun!
I wasn’t able to find my grater and don’t have a food processor so I tried using my vitamix for the butter, as it’s ground up walnuts before like a food processor would, and that is something I’d definitely do different next time . . . but they tasted incredible nevertheless. I brought some in for my coworkers and they loved them! I think for the colder seasons these would be good with cinnamon and nutmeg!
Tried these this morning and they were perfect! Love your recipes. You are my go to girl 😉
I’m not sure what went wrong with mine, firstly my dough was quite dry and I baked it for 30mins in which time it went very golden brown but it’s nowhere near cooked through but if I left it in any longer it would have burnt.
I’m from the UK but converted all the measurements but it just hasn’t worked and I was so looking forward to these! 🙁
Just made these. Delish! Thanks so much for sharing this recipe, Sally.
I have tried making scones with some other recipes before and they came out ok, but when I made these scones they were AMAZING!! I will defiantly be making them again! Thanks so much Sally!
Just made these and they are awesome. Pretty much all of my baking is now from your recipes. My co-workers are very happy! Thank you very much and keep up the good work (I have your cookbook too which is fantastic)!
This is the first time I have had success with a scone recipe. So delicious. It is now in my favorites stash. Thank you!
Absolutely fabulous recipe! I have been addicted to my local bakery’s scones, but it is a $2/day addiction so I have been looking for a good recipe so I can make my own. This recipe actually has better flavor than my bakery’s scones! Great job Sally!
I made these over the weekend and they are delicious! I added the zest of an orange to mine (because I had some oranges I needed to use up) and used half orange extract and half vanilla extract. I WISH I had had mini chips but used regular sized semi sweet chips and it worked out fine…plenty of chocolate in each bite! I know I will be making these again and again…and again!
I store mine in the refrigerator – did the same with your Lemon Strawberry Poppyseed scones – and have had good luck eating on them for many days afterwards. Certainly not as good as fresh out of the oven but…sitting at my desk at work, it is a decadent treat I look forward to and enjoy. 🙂
Thanks SO much for the recipe! LOVE LOVE LOVE these!
I just made these scones. They are fantastic! I have only made scones once before this (blueberry) and they were just like cake (awful). These scones have the perfect crunchy crust paired with a very moist inside. They are just great. Thanks so much for the recipe. Will definitely be keeping it 🙂 I also had no course sugar. I am sure it was even tastier with that.
Hi Sally, I made these this past weekend and they were absolutely incredible! I followed every single step and they came out absolutely perfect. My in laws were a bit impressed with my newfound baking skills! I cannot wait to try more of your recipes. You have definitely gained another loyal follower. Thank you!
Wow. These were absolutely amazing! I’m not big on scones and all the crunch they come with but these were moist and crumbly and I can assure you, I didn’t eat just one! Definitely a keeper!!
Hi Sally!
I made these scones this morning. They were extremely moist, tender, and had an unbelievably high rise to them. So fluffy and utterly delicious. Everyone loved them. I think the key was definetly the heavy cream, and the brown sugar (I used dark brown sugar, which produced a scone with a very deep rich molasses flavor! yum!). The mini chocolate chips just set it over the top. You got the perfect amount of chocolate in every bite. This will for sure be my absolute “go-to” scone recipe from here on out. It’s ridiculously perfect……so good! Thank you! Once again….you hit it out of the park!! ; )
Ps. Best wishes on your wedding planning!! So happy and thrilled for you both! How exciting! : )
I made these tonight…the first time I’ve ever made scones, and they were delicious (wish I could attach a picture)! I was worried that I had done something wrong since my dough was not wet as you mentioned it might be, but they turned out perfect. I agree that a heaping cup of chocolate chips and sugar on top before baking probably makes them even better. Thank you for sharing!!
I tried this recipe tonight. It’s seriously one of the best scone recipes I’ve tried. So good…tender yet crisp. I will definitely make again!
Can blueberries be substituted for the mini chocolate?
Definitely. Enjoy!